23 January 2008

Yes, finally finished the sewing up etc on Monday night. Hoorah! It's not my favourite & not perfect, but certainly wearable (in winter - it's heavy). I've learnt a lot along the way - collars need increases over shoulder seams or more elaborate shaping, things for me really do need to be lengthened from the pattern, don't try reverse engineering a rib pattern to plain stocking stitch without a ton more thought involved.

In order to celebrate, more stash has been purchased. Mostly cottons in different weights. More planning to come once the purple vest is done!

14 January 2008

Have started on the next vest. Yes instead of finishing projects already started.... I need to reduce the stash! Well, that's my excuse at any rate. Must not buy more wool until I've used more stash, must be strong despite sales at Spotlight.

Decided on a bobbly fringe for it for something bit different- the sugar drop pattern from Nicky Epstein's 'Knitting on the Edge'. It's basically triangles with 3 bobbles off each point. Once again the Cleckheaton Classics Macrokids vest pattern (size 10) was modified to fit a multiple of 13 stitches (so I had to do 17 triangles with 3 bobbles each). I'm using 4mm needles with a lovely deep purple Cleckheaton 8ply machine washable Crepe from the stash. I have 8 balls of it & hopefully that will be enough. The armbands & v-neck wil be done in moss stitch to match the edge of the sugar drop pattern.

The sugar drop edging did seem to take eons, but I'm now into the straight stocking stitch so it's zooming along and requires no brainpower until I get to the armholes. Once again I'm knitting it in the round on circular needles to the armholes to avoid sewing up, and I'll do the armbands before sewing up the shoulders in order to avoid using DPNs in the round for the armholes. The v-neck will fit nicely on circular needles as well. Hoorah!

Also bought the most recent copy of AU Creative Knitting - there are a few cool patterns in there that I'm adding to the "to-do" list. Particularly the girl's Zhivago cardi with lace edging - I have a stash of ice-blue Zhivago which will be perfect for that.

08 January 2008

It was meant to be a blah, blah secret plan, however the cat (or in this case present) was out of the bag on Saturday.

I used the Cleckheaton Microkids Vest pattern & modified... with cables, circular needles to armhole, different order for sewing up etc. The Cleckheaton country naturals in 8ply maroon (4mm needles) with whitish fleck looks lovely knitted up. I only ended up using 4 balls instead of the 5 recommended for the pattern. I wasn't sure how the cabling would go as it's years since I had done any - but looks fine (despite me being unable to count rows over Xmas and having to redo sections of the cable panel).

Actually it was a lot of fun knitting for size 2! Done quickly - started on 26 Dec and finished & all sewn up last week. Photos to come once I press it.